Chapter 216: Spider Doctor
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 216: Spider Doctor
The pinnacle of ancient healing arts, Dokkaebi King Eulparyeong.
Bimungol, the fortress he led, was the last bastion on earth fighting against the White Lion's army.
Refugees from all corners of the land had gathered in the Dokkaebi fortress.
Elves from the Fairy Forest, dwarves who had fled the Dwarven Citadel.
Avians and Beastfolk, barbarian tribes who hadn't even had a concept of a kingdom until then, the few surviving Fox Spirits, Kappa, Orcs, Lizards. And humans.
[Stele of Mass Annihilation]
With this masterpiece, born from the collective mysterious power and magic of the Dokkaebi, the allied refugee forces and the Dokkaebi army fought to the death.
“Lightning Shock.”
“Ice Spike.”
“Living Plague.”
“Meteor Shower!”
“Ice Explosion.”
“Thunderbolt.”
The remnants of the Avians flew overhead, raining arrows down on the ground, while the Orcs and Barbarians hurled boulders.
In return, boulders flew toward the fortress walls from the ground, launched by catapults brought by the army of the Abyss.
And a battering ram.
“The gate is breaking!”
“Go reinforce it!”
When the gate boomed—thud, thud—it was an emergency.
Skillful dwarves converged on the gate. In an instant, they fashioned a barricade, layering it with steel plates and logs.
But then.
“L-look at that!”
The dwarves shrieked, having spotted something shocking. The Cannoneer Shark was aiming its main cannon directly at the gate. Immense energy gathered at the tip of its barrel.
‘Annihilation Barrage.’
Even in the age of myths, no one besides the God of Naval Cannons could use such a technique. Not a single adventurer traveling the Labyrinth had ever obtained such a power from a blessing fountain.
A Tier 9 skill was simply too powerful for human hands to wield.
KABOOM!
After the main cannon unleashed a torrent of light and particles, nothing remained of the gate. Not the meter-thick steel door, not the barricade behind it, not even the dwarves who had been reinforcing it.
“The gate has been breached!”
As the Labyrinth’s army swarmed in, the adventurers gathered.
“Hold them back!”
The last warriors to survive the Labyrinth’s great continental feast were mostly former Labyrinth adventurers.
From the 1st floor to the Deep Layer.
They all gathered, regardless of individual skill, party, or race, squeezing out everything they had.
“Pack Hunter.”
“Giant War Machine.”
“Barrage!”
Though now, not even their names, let alone their existence, remained.
“Buy time until the Stele is activated!”
“Field-Splitter!”
The Chief Inspector of the refugee coalition.
“Sword Draw of the Fierce Tiger Emerging from the Forest.”
A warrior of the Tiger-folk who once vied with Garvinga for the throne.
“Holy Anointment. Mark of Salvation.”
Cardinals from various temples.
“Breakwater of Wisdom!”
And the Abyssal Mages.
“Tolling of the Bell of Vigilance.”
“Archmage! Summon the Ethereal Lake!”
“Positive Charge Bullet!”
“Come forth, Lord of the Ethereal Magic Tower!”
Their forces could have been called the strongest on the continent at the time, but the army that rose from the Abyss was no ordinary foe.
‘The Silver Dagger Federation.’
Their bodies were translucent like ghosts, the silhouettes of their limbs indistinct.
These demons, each with a silver dagger embedded deep in their chest, relentlessly fired off all kinds of high-tier magic.
“Blood-red Fortress.”
“Mass Necrosis.”
“Abyssal Flame.”
“Steel Thunderbolt.”
And that wasn't all.
“Lancers are coming!”
“It’s the Dagger Raptors!”
The onslaught of monsters, empowered beyond even the Abyss, was not something anyone could easily face.
Everyone threw their lives on the line, buying time in a fierce, close-quarters battle until the Tier 10 Stele of Mass Annihilation was activated.
Whenever the fighting lulled, Eulparyeong was faced with an overwhelming number of casualties.
“I wish I had eight arms.”
The last Dokkaebi King remaining on the surface from among the nine lords was a master of healing, but in the face of the brutal battle of Bimungol, his power was far too weak.
For every patient he treated, two more would breathe their last beside him.
“Let’s make talismans.”
At the suggestion of a Spirit Race Deep Layer Taoist, Eulparyeong devised a new method of healing.
It was a talisman-infused bandage.
Like a roll of paper towels with the same pattern printed at regular intervals, he imbued healing magic into the bandages at set intervals, creating a bundle of talismans.
“Distribute the bandages to the wounded!”
Eulparyeong couldn't be everywhere on the battlefield at once. A Dokkaebi only has two arms.
“Eulparyeong.”
But soon, even the bandages ran out.
They were short on all supplies. Potions, medicinal herbs, bandages, and helping hands.
“Use these.”
The Dokkaebi Queen went door-to-door through the city’s residential areas, gathering clothes.
She had the large pile of garments cut into long strips to make makeshift bandages, washed them clean, and brought them to Eulparyeong.
And among them…
“This is…”
There was the silk blouse and skirt he had personally gifted to the queen.
“I cannot tell you not to push yourself, Eulparyeong.”
The queen said as she offered the clothes.
“You must win.”
The Dokkaebi King’s shoulders were heavy.
*
The defeat of Bimungol, which had held out so well, came in an instant.
It was as if a human, tired of watching ants fight, had simply poured water over them.
The Great Eruption of the Labyrinth.
When black mist began to spew from the Bimungol Labyrinth, which the Dokkaebi elders and a few Deep Layer adventurers had sealed and were controlling, everyone realized the truth.
The Labyrinth Master was making his move personally.
“Eulparyeong!”
At the elders’ shouts, Eulparyeong sprinted to the Labyrinth stairs.
But what was there was not a staircase.
It was…
“A tower…?”
When a frog has indigestion, it vomits out its entire stomach, letting it dangle from its mouth, then presses it with its front feet to squeeze it out.
If the Labyrinth was the intestine of a great demon, it was now vomiting its stomach like that frog.
That was how Eulparyeong felt.
The walls and depths of the Labyrinth inverted and rose to the surface. The 1st floor of the tower.
A giant whale rose from the mist. Mushroom spores rained down.
In the middle of the city, various ‘pressure plates’ began to appear with metallic clicks. They were the Labyrinth’s traps.
“What is this…”
The tower of the Labyrinth was rising, one floor at a time.
“How…”
Not the warriors of the Deep Layer, not the Elven sages, not the Orc shamans, not the wizards or priests, not even the healer Eulparyeong.
No one in the world had ever seen anything like this.
RUMBLE!
The ground shook.
Eulparyeong’s eyes met with the demon at the top of the tower.
The moment he saw it, he knew instinctively.
‘We’ve lost.’
It was a force that could destroy the world, the final predator at the apex of the food chain.
He was a wizard of active volcanoes.
The tremors intensified. Cracks formed in the ground as earth and rock began to rise.
Lava shot up from the ground.
The scorching fire and flames were the Labyrinth’s digestive fluids, purifying and absorbing everything.
“Aaaaaargh!”
In an instant, Bimungol began to transform into the heart of hell.
“Put out the fire!”
Wizards summoned clouds and poured down rain.
But the flames and lava were completely unaffected.
It was a heat that could not be quenched.
“Activate the Stele!”
The Deep Layer adventurers activated the Stele of Mass Annihilation, but even the immense power it released could not reach the demon in the tower.
Squeeze.
The monster clenched its fist in the air.
Pop!
The characters on the Stele were changing.
[We guard the ruins left by the defeated lord.
All evil things are forbidden to approach.]
“…”
Eulparyeong had a feeling he knew who that defeated lord was.
“How could you do something so cruel…”
The defeated lord was the Dokkaebi King himself.
The fire and lava now began to swallow all the people of Bimungol.
“Stop it!”
Eulparyeong screamed and started running up the tower’s stairs, toward the demon standing at the top.
“Don’t! Don’t you dare!”
His body began to change.
Hideous hair sprouted from the strong, beautiful legs that his citizens and his queen had loved. His legs began to multiply, one by one. His chest shrank and his abdomen swelled. His eyes multiplied. His vision became a dizzying mess.
Eulparyeong slipped and fell on the stairs time and again, but he scrambled back up, crashing into things as he went.
“Stop, you son of a bitch!” he roared in fury.
“If you’re going to kill them, kill me too!”
“You,” the demon said kindly when the Dokkaebi King reached the top.
“You’re short on hands and bandages.”
“…”
“I understand the helplessness you felt when you had to take back the silk blouse and skirt from your woman.”
The Labyrinth Master patted the Spider Doctor’s head as if in pity.
“Look. I’ll let you say goodbye to your woman.”
Outside the window, he could see his people burning in the flames of hell. He could hear their screams.
“Eulparyeong!”
Among them was the queen of Bimungol.
“Eulparyeong…!”
Searching for her husband, she was suffocating from the immense heat and smoke that had blanketed all of Bimungol.
As she collapsed, her eyes met Eulparyeong’s.
Eulparyeong looked away.
He knew.
He couldn't save anyone.
They were all going to die.
He didn't want the last memory his wife had to be of this hideous monster’s face.
Eulparyeong couldn't even hold his dying wife’s hand.
“How pitiful,” the Labyrinth Master said.
“Spider Doctor.”
*
The ‘God of Thread and Surgery’ from the age of myths.
He could create a magical thread that would never break and was infinite in length. He used this thread to tend to the wounds of all living creatures.
At the end of the era of the Nine Ancient Kings, Eulparyeong had obtained the medical arts he had so desperately craved, but now there was no one left to heal.
Instead, his spider silk…
FWOOSH!
It shot into the air and penetrated the water. It didn't get soggy or fray even when wet.
Like a net.
“Got it!”
The mass of spider silk swept through the water, capturing the Cannoneer Shark along with a Mermaid, a few torpedoes, and some Water Ghosts.
But there was another problem.
“…!”
The Spider Doctor had intended to drag the Cannoneer Shark to the ground, but instead, he was the one being pulled.
Like a powerful fish yanking on a fishing rod.
Zzzzzip!
The Spider Doctor’s massive body was lifted into the air.
FWOOM!
The Spider Doctor shot out even more silk from both hands.
“It’s slowed down!” Yernil shouted.
“Get it now! Aimus!”
Just as Caleb had taught her on the 7th floor, she tied a rope around Aimus’s belt and her own body.
“I’ll get you inside!”
Back Attack leaped in front of the two.
“A clone?”
“It’s the real me!”
Back Attack grabbed Aimus and used Shadow Leap.
With perfect timing, Yernil activated Warden’s Reposition.
Once inside the water, they headed for the Cannoneer Shark, which was swimming while dragging the net.
‘Tsunami Iron Staff.’
Aimus began to surf.
WHOOSH!
Two Void Torpedoes that had been circling the Cannoneer Shark moved.
CLANG!
Back Attack threw a dagger, destroying one of them.
BOOM!
Yernil shot down the other with an arrow.
“There’s one coming from below!”
Directly beneath the floating mass of water, a Void Torpedo was flying up from under Aimus’s surfing feet. The angle was impossible for Yernil to shoot.
“I’ll block it!”
Back Attack dropped down, shot out from under the water bubble, and blocked the torpedo with his body.
With the explosion, he swapped places with the Mirror Rogue.
“Now…”
On the ground, the Spider Doctor, who was holding the Cannoneer Shark with his net, saw something and his expression hardened.
“Wait!”
The Cannoneer Shark, which had been resisting and dragging the net, stopped moving. It had pushed the other monsters caught in the net in front of it like a barricade and was aiming its main cannon from behind them.
An immense amount of magic power gathered in the cannon. The Spider Doctor knew what it was.
A piece of a very old memory resurfaced.
“It’s the Annihilation Barrage!”
The same skill that had melted the gates of Bimungol in a single blow.
The Labyrinth Master’s party member, the Lancer, had the ultimate defense; the White Lion had the ultimate mobility; and the Cannoneer Shark had the ultimate offense.
“Wait! You have to dodge that—!”
The Spider Doctor bellowed, but his voice didn't reach them.
Aimus charged straight ahead, with Yernil behind him.
A blast of intense heat erupted from the main cannon in a straight line.
*
Half of the water mass boiled in an instant, turning into steam.
A steam explosion.
When one liter of water turns into gas, its volume expands by a staggering 1,679 times. The water mass summoned by the Cannoneer Shark had cohesive properties like an Ethereal Lake, the space within the water was limited by that pressure, and the sudden creation of a massive amount of steam…
BOOM!
It created a jet propulsion effect in the direction the main cannon was aimed.
A huge spray of water and instantly boiled steam.
A thick, white mist completely obscured their vision.
“…”
The strength drained from the Spider Doctor’s body.
“What the fuck…”
On the ground, Back Attack’s clone, who had been fighting the 7th floor monsters alone, froze in shock.
And then.
‘Rhinoceros Horn.’
From within that immense cloud of steam, creating a tidal wave.
The Monk reappeared.
“What…”
Even the Cannoneer Shark couldn't hide its astonishment.
“How did you survive—!”
CRASH! CRASH! CRASH!
Amidst the crashing tidal wave, the Monk began to run.
The tattered fragments of his Magic Parasol scattered in all directions on the current.
And the Monk’s body glowed red-hot like molten iron.
Steel Parasol, Steel Veins, and Steel Absorber.
He was the Monk of Steel.
He was the incarnation of Kalung.
And he was that wizard’s vanguard.
Sizzzzzle!
The water boiled. His iron staff had been superheated by the Annihilation Barrage.
CRUNCH!
And because of that intense heat, the staff, despite not having a sharp tip, tore through the Cannoneer Shark’s armor and began to dig in.
“You… you bastard…”
The composure vanished from the face of the monstrous Inter-floor Lord. He grabbed the iron staff and grunted, but he couldn't escape from Rhinoceros Horn. And then.
‘Warden’s Reposition.’
In their party, the one with the strongest attack power was the Ranger.
Click.
Yernil, protected by Aimus who had taken the full brunt of the attack, was completely unharmed. She appeared behind the Cannoneer Shark.
Her arrowhead aimed for the back of the shark’s neck.
‘Barrage!’